Melandri takes title momentum to Misano

5 June 2012

Marco Melandri will get a third attempt to wrap up a World Superbike Championship victory on home soil this season as the series heads back to Italy for round seven at Misano.

The former MotoGP front runner has been in fine form in recent races, notching up BMW's first-ever WSBK wins at Donington Park and Miller Motorsports Park to move within 18 points of leader Max Biaggi in the overall standings.

It is momentum he is confident of maintaining when the series resumes at the recently dubbed 'Marco Simoncelli Circuit' on the Adriatic coast, even if Melandri admits his recent success will mean there is greater pressure on his shoulders than there was at Imola or Monza.

“I am excited to go to Misano. It is the first time I will arrive in Italy after having won a race with BMW, so I expect many fans to turn out. I am definitely proud to come to Misano after what we have achieved in the last two rounds.

“I will have a lot of pressure on my shoulders, because there will be high expectations as everybody thinks that I can get a good result there too. But I like that. At the last three rounds, we had three completely different types of tracks and our RR worked well on all of them.

“Misano is another different track, so it is going to be interesting to see how competitive we can be there. And actually, it will be the first time this season that we will race in very hot conditions. The Misano circuit is nice, but it has many stop and go corners. As such, it is going to be much more important to have a good position on the starting grid than it was in Salt Lake City. We have to be very focused on producing a good performance in qualifying.”